1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an auxiliary lens such as a conversion lens and a filter used for cameras and products with a built-in camera including a cellular phone with a built-in camera, and more particularly, concerns an auxiliary lens including an auxiliary-lens body and a washer connected to the auxiliary-lens body at one end face and mounted to a camera and the like at the other end and being capable of connection between the washer and the auxiliary-lens body by a magnetic force.
In the present invention, the auxiliary lens denotes “that which is joined to a lens of a camera and the like for changing the optical characteristic of the camera lens or protecting the camera lens in cooperation with the lens as necessary.”
In the present invention, the camera and the like refer to “cameras including a digital camera and devices including an objective lens for image formation such as a cellular phone with a built-in camera and a disposable camera.”
2. Description of the Related Art
As is generally known, particularly high-grade cameras are capable of mounting a so-called auxiliary lens such as a conversion lens including a telephoto lens and a wide-angle lens and a filter.
More specifically, these cameras have filter screws around a lens and the auxiliary lenses have screws to be screwed to the filter screws, which allows the auxiliary lenses to be mounted to the cameras depending on circumstances. Accordingly, the cameras are capable of telephotography and wide-angle photography by preference, thus increasing the working range of cameras.
So-called middle-class cameras, however, have no filter screws, thus being unable to use the auxiliary lenses such as a conversion lens.
In recent years, for example, digital cameras of about 3,200,000 pixels are popular, which are generally called middle-class cameras. Since the middle-class cameras have no filter screws, it is impossible to mount a conversion lens such as a telephoto lens and a wide-angle lens, thus having a problem of limiting the working range.
Even when the filter screws are provided, available conversion lenses are limited depending on the diameter of the filter, thus having a problem that desired conversion lenses are not available.
Furthermore, in mounting the conversion lenses, a system of mounting the conversion lenses by using a lens adaptor and so on is provided in addition to the filter screw system. The lens adaptors must be mounted to cameras each time the conversion lenses are mounted, thus having a problem of burdensome works.
Also, camera built-in products such as a popular cellular phone with a built-in camera are not supposed to mount the auxiliary lens, so that it is impossible to use the auxiliary lens.